4 Weeks To Go!

Aaaaaargh!  Feels very surreal to be saying 4 weeks to go until we hitch up the camper and head west for 7 or so months on the road!!  Aaaaargh – soooooooo much to do before then!  However, we are getting there. Only 5 more days at work left for me, 14 more shifts left at work for Matt.  The kids have their last swimming lesson tomorrow. Our container arrives early next week along with backup in the form of my Mum who will spend a week with us hopefully getting us all moved out of our house and everything clean and ready for our tenants who have signed on the dotted line for a twelve month lease!!  Welcome to the Samford Road crew, Van Schoor family!

Bonfire and roast dinner to welcome the soon to be new residents of ‘our house’.

The Samford Road kids! Don’t mess with them!

Matt has been super busy this last month, putting in lots of overtime at work, making a bizzilion phone calls chasing down car/camper parts and spare tyres, insurance quotes, changing our mobile phones over to Telstra so hopefully we get better coverage while we’re travelling, and organising our home removal/container for storage.  It’s all made for a pretty crazy last few weeks!

Goofing around – showing off our new first aid kits and spare tyre rubbish bag!

We’re really excited (I know – excited about a rubbish bin?!?!?) about our new ‘Bushranger Wheelie Bin’ which goes on the back of the spare tyre on Peter Prado.  We’ve wanted one of these for ages as we are always looking for somewhere to keep all our rubbish locked away from wildlife when camping, especially in National Parks where rubbish bins are not provided and you have to take all your rubbish out – as a five member family we are able to generate far too much rubbish over a week of camping which usually must be stored in the back of the car (very smelly!) until we come across a bin to dispose of it all!  We got a great discount on our First Aid kits from Give Life Center for being members of the MySwag forum.

Matt has also spent two seperate days as an apprentice mechanic learning how to service the car and the camper this month.  I was a little nervous that Matt had pulled the car apart and couldn’t put it back together when he had been gone for 10 hours on the day he serviced the car – but many thanks to ‘talktotheroo’ from Prado Point who spent the day showing Matt the ropes and sending both Matt and the car home in one piece!  Last week we added a  snorkel to Peter Prado – we’re looking bush ready now!!

Peter Prado’s new bling – a snorkel!

Karen Camper is now sporting new brakes and bearings, and has been greased all over after a day spent at Caboolture Caravan Repair.  Many thanks to Adrian there who again allowed Matt to be on the tools for the day.  Matt has learnt so much from those two days and we are feeling much more confident that we can deal with any small mechanical issues that we may come across as we travel.  A trip back to Russell at Kedron Car Electrics sorted out all the brake/lights etc issues – many thanks Rus!

Karen Camper at the Caravan ‘Day Spa’ – getting a service!

The packing/clearing out continues – we have to be out of our house by the 25th of May so the countdown is really on!  I came back from a night out at bookclub a few weeks ago to find our lounge gone – so Gumtree is doing its job!!!

Trailer load off to the dump – very liberating feeling!

Now we just need to sell our little ‘Haris the Yaris’ who is providing our petrol money for the trip.  Anybody know somebody who needs a great first car or family runabout??

For Sale – Haris the Yaris http://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/camp-mountain/cars-vans-utes/2010-toyota-yaris-5-door-hatchback-still-under-warranty/1017844289

And just proof that the kids are still alive – we haven’t given them away yet!  So, we’re getting there, we just want to get on the road now!!!

Fealy kids still smiling despite their tired and stressed mum and dad!!